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It didn’t happen all at once.
Grief never did. It leaked in slowly, soaked your skin in memories, settled behind your ribs–beside your heart, like a tumor.
You didn’t get the call. You got the absence of it. An empty inbox. A silent line. And then Alfred—steady, composed Alfred—whose voice cracked just enough to tell you everything.
Jason was gone.
You were nineteen. He was eighteen. One year apart, but soul-matched in defiance. You were the one he called when Bruce said no. The one who knew how that felt—how the word stuck in your throat, how it made you reckless.
And this time, it wasn’t just any defiance. It was personal.
He’d gotten a lead about his mother. A sliver of a chance. He said he didn’t expect her to be perfect, or kind, or even good. He just needed to know. He loved Bruce and Alfred—God, he adored them, even when he couldn’t say it. He’d do anything for Dick, would defend him in one breath and punch him in the next. But there was still this part of him—a bleeding edge, something unresolved—that needed answers. Needed to understand why his life started the way it did. Why she left. Why he never got to know her.
Bruce had said no. He said it was a setup, too dangerous, too uncertain. He told Jason to wait.
And Jason told you.
You knew how it burned. The waiting. The powerlessness. You looked into his eyes—so full of longing, so impossibly young—and you said, "Then go. Find her."
You didn’t know that would be the last time you’d feel his heartbeat.
You didn’t know it would get him killed.
The first week after… you couldn’t bring yourself to eat much. Or do much else, honestly.
The news was like a weight dropped onto your chest, and no matter how many days passed, you couldn’t seem to breathe around it. People tried to help. Friends. Classmates. Your parents. Professors. They offered food, company, soft words. You snapped at them. Bit down on kindness with grief-sharpened teeth. You weren’t angry at them. You were just… sad. Bone-deep, marrow-rotting sad.
And losing a partner wasn’t the same as losing a parent, or a sibling, or a friend.
It was worse, in its own, horrifying way. Because you’d chosen him. You’d loved him in quiet, deliberate ways—chosen him in the moments between chaos. And now he was gone, and nothing felt real.
You stopped responding to messages. Missed classes. Let your coursework rot in the back of your bag. The university noticed. Your grades slipped. You didn’t care.
Your parents did.
They got you into therapy. At first, you refused. The thought of sitting in a room with a stranger and sharing the pain was unbearable. You didn’t want to speak it into the air and make it more real than it already was.
You went, anyway. After a particularly stern talking to from your mother, telling you that this couldn’t go on any longer. You needed good grades to get into your graduate program, after all.
You hated it. The first few sessions were a quiet, seething hell. For weeks, you sat in silence. Arms crossed so tightly your shoulders ached. Head low so you wouldn’t meet anyone’s eyes—not the therapist’s, not your own in the reflection of her glasses. Every question she asked felt like a scalpel. Too sharp. Too close. Like she was trying to peel you open and name all the pieces inside.
You weren’t ready for that. You weren’t ready to say his name out loud. Not in that room. Not in any room.
When she asked you what happened, you clenched your jaw until it hurt. When she offered you tissues, you didn’t take them. When she said it was okay to be angry, you stared at the floor like you could burn a hole through it.
You were angry. Furious, even—but not at him. Never at him.
You were angry at yourself. For saying, "Go." For meaning it. For being the one person who should’ve known better—should’ve stopped him—and instead handed him the push he needed to fall headfirst into his grave.
The guilt festered like a wound that wouldn’t close. And you thought, if you spoke it aloud, it would make it real. Concrete. Unforgivable.
But something shifted one afternoon.
You had shown up, out of obligation more than hope, and sat in the same chair you always did. Cold fingers gripping your sleeves, nerves frayed like wires. Your therapist didn’t ask anything that day. She just sat there. Quiet. Patient. Breathing softly across from you.
And for the first time, the silence didn’t feel like pressure. It felt like space.
And you cried.
Ugly, open sobs that collapsed your shoulders and twisted your mouth and shook your whole body like a tree in a storm. It wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t poetic. It was raw and wrenching and real.
You told her everything.
The guilt. The choice. The way you had told him to go. How you had said it like a gift, like liberation—when it had been a death sentence. How it felt like your hands were dipped in blood every time you looked at them. How the memory clung to you, cold and sticky and alive.
You told her how some mornings you woke up with his name on your lips, like he’d just walked out the door. How some nights you still reached across the bed for a shape that wasn’t there.
You told her how grief had gutted you. How it still did.
She didn’t interrupt. Didn’t correct you. Didn’t say it wasn’t your fault.
She just listened.
And somehow, that was enough.
It wasn’t a fix. It wasn’t even relief.
But it was the first time you didn’t feel like you were drowning alone.
And that was enough, for a start.
Healing wasn’t linear.
Some days, you thought you were okay. Then you'd hear a laugh like his in the grocery store, or catch the scent of his cologne in a crowd, and you’d feel like you were drowning all over again.
Once, it was a hoodie in the back of your closet. One he’d stolen from you and stretched out. You found it while looking for something else and sat on the floor for an hour, hugging it to your chest, sobbing like he’d just died yesterday.
But slowly—painfully—you got better.
The guilt that plagued you started to ebb. Bit by bit by bit.
Initially, his death felt like the worst thing in the world every single day. It was the first thought when you opened your eyes, the last one when you closed them.
After a year and a half, it was the second thing.
Eventually, the third.
You never forgot him.
He was kind. He was caring. He was a smart-mouthed, soft-hearted boy who brought you chaos and comfort in equal measure.
You still kept the polaroid from when he invited you to his senior prom. He was in the nicest suit he owned, grinning like he’d won the lottery just having you there.
Your ringtone for a few people was still set to his favorite song. Something fast and loud and stupid. It made you smile, even when it hurt.
You got back on your feet. Slowly, yes—but surely. The days stretched out longer. The sun felt a little warmer. You made friends in your program. You started laughing again.
After two and a half years, you thought—maybe—it was time to start dating again.
It didn’t go well.
The people were kind, mostly. But they weren’t him. They didn’t make your heart kick sideways when they looked at you. They didn’t know how to make you laugh from your stomach, or hold your wrist gently when you were anxious.
No one ever lasted.
You told yourself that was fine.
You were twenty one. You had time.
The world kept turning, and you had started turning with it—no longer stubbornly looking back, no longer clinging to memories like they could bring him to you again.
You made space for new dreams, kept your head down, worked hard in your classes.
There were good days. Warm ones. Quiet mornings where you caught yourself smiling without guilt. Sometimes you even imagined what your future might look like. A life built with patience. A life where the ache dulled to something you could carry without breaking.
And then you saw him.
It was late. Your shift had run over, and your body ached with the familiar burn of overwork—muscles sore, eyelids heavy, brain fogged with too many patients and too little rest. You were walking home in scrubs, the fabric clinging to your skin from the misty rain that had started to fall, keys laced between your fingers, humming a song you couldn’t name. Just another night. Just another tired breath, another stretch of cracked sidewalk beneath your shoes.
And then your breath caught mid-step.
There—across the street, beneath the flicker of a dying streetlamp—he stood.
Black jacket. Broad shoulders. That crooked stance, casual and coiled at the same time, like he was daring the world to try him. You knew that stance. Had leaned against it. Had run your hands over the leather and rested your head against those shoulders more times than you could count.
Your brain stalled. Refused to compute. For a second, you truly thought you were hallucinating. Sleep-deprived. Stress-delirious. It rewound. Glitched. Tried to place a logical explanation where one didn’t exist. A stranger. A ghost. A trick of the light.
But then he looked up.
And you saw those eyes.
Green. Startling. Too sharp to be kind, too soft to be cruel. Eyes that held memories you hadn’t let yourself touch in years.
You knew them.
Your heart plunged into your stomach, heavy and sick, like a weight dropped from a great height. Your pulse roared in your ears, blood rushing so loudly you could barely hear the distant sounds of the city anymore. Everything around you narrowed—blurred—until it was just him and the cold slap of the wind on your face.
You stepped off the curb without thinking. Barely noticed the screech of tires somewhere behind you. You crossed the street like gravity had tilted, and he was the only thing holding you to the earth.
Closer. Closer.
Every step felt like walking through water, thick and slow and disbelieving. Your fingers were trembling. Your breath refused to come steady. The air between you crackled like static.
You stopped inches away.
"Jason?" you breathed, voice breaking over the name like it was made of glass.
He didn’t smile. Didn’t speak. Just looked at you—like he was trying to memorize you all over again. Like maybe he’d been standing under that streetlamp for a while, unsure if he’d actually come close.
You reached out.
You touched him.
His jaw was bruised. His knuckles bloodied. But it was him. His pulse was real beneath your fingers.
So you hit him.
Your fist cracked against his chest. Once. Twice. You weren’t even sure what for. For the years. For the silence. For the fact that you had buried him and here he was, alive and looking at you like he was the one who’d been left behind.
"You died," you choked, tears spilling fast. "You died. I buried you, Jason—"
He didn’t block you. Didn’t flinch. Just let you rage. Let you crumble.
"You said you'd just talk to her. You said you’d be fine. You promised me you’d be careful . "
He swallowed hard, the motion in his throat tight. "I thought I would be."
You hit him again, open-handed this time, and then your fingers curled in his jacket like you might fall apart if you let go. Confusion crashed over you in waves—grief, fury, disbelief, all tangled up in the shape of him standing there like no time had passed.
"I don’t understand," you whispered, eyes wild. "How are you here? Why didn’t you tell me?"
He didn’t answer right away. Just stared at you like he wanted to, like the words were there and too dangerous to say. Like maybe he didn’t know how to start.
"Because I didn’t know if I was still him," he said at last. Quiet. Almost ashamed. "Didn’t know if I’d be someone you could still love."
Your knees buckled before the sob even escaped. But his arms caught you. Without hesitation. Like they remembered how.
You clung to him. Rain soaking through both your clothes. Heart pounding against his. Mind screaming that this couldn’t be real. That things didn’t just go back to the way they were.
They couldn’t. You wouldn’t let them.
But for now, you stayed right there.
Held by the ghost you had never stopped loving.
Held by the boy who had died and come back something else entirely.
And you didn't know what would come next.
Only that he was here.
And he was holding you just like he always had.
The months that followed felt like liminal space. Like you’d stepped sideways out of time.
Jason was back—but not really. The edges of him were sharper. The light behind his eyes dimmer. He flinched more, spoke less, and smiled like it cost him something. There were nights he would show up with blood on his hands and dirt under his fingernails, jaw clenched like he was holding back the end of the world. And you never asked where he'd been. You never asked why he looked at himself like he wasn’t sure he belonged in his own skin.
But he came to you. When the blood ran too hot, when the mission pushed too far, when he had nowhere else to go—he came.
You never stopped letting him in.
Tonight, the air was too still.
Gotham had a sound to it—constant, low, alive. Sirens, traffic, the hum of neon, that far-off sound of chaos you’d grown used to. It was a city that never slept, and you’d learned to fall asleep to its noise like a lullaby.
But tonight, the silence crept in thick and unnatural, curling around your apartment like fog. Even the ticking clock on your wall felt loud. You didn’t need a phone call. You didn’t need a text. Your bones just knew.
Jason was bleeding again.
You didn’t turn on the light outside of the door. You never did, not when it was him. Just the hallway lamp, casting a warm gold glow across the hardwood floor. The med kit was already open on the kitchen counter, supplies laid out with the same careful precision you used in your practice—alcohol wipes, gauze, antiseptic. A towel, already damp with warm water.
You didn’t pace. Didn’t wring your hands or flick glances at the door. That wasn’t how you waited for Jason.
You just sat. Steady. A quiet presence in the dark.
You remembered the first time he showed up at your door post-resurrection, soaked in rain and blood and guilt. You hadn’t spoken. Just guided him to the bathroom, sat him on the edge of the tub, and cleaned him up. He watched you like he expected you to vanish any second, like kindness was a language he no longer understood.
And tonight was no different.
The door opened just past midnight. No knock. He never knocked. He let himself in, quiet like a shadow, the hinges creaking softly as he pushed the door closed behind him.
You looked up from the armrest of the couch.
His shirt was torn. There was blood down one sleeve and a cut across his cheekbone. His eyes were unreadable, but they landed on you like he was half-relieved, half-terrified you’d finally stopped waiting.
You didn’t say anything.
Just nodded once. The smallest gesture.
He crossed the room slowly. Every step was a confession.
And when he stood in front of you, not quite meeting your eyes, you reached for him.
Not to pull. Not to fix.
Just to touch. Just to let him know you were still here.
He exhaled like it hurt.
Like being seen hurt.
And then, with a tremble so faint it might’ve been imagined, Jason Todd sat down beside you and let you take his hand.
You didn’t ask him to talk.
You just started cleaning the blood from his knuckles.
The silence wasn’t empty.
It was everything he didn’t know how to say.
Because if there was one thing he had never known how to handle, it was someone waiting for him like he was worth the wait.
You worked gently, dabbing antiseptic over scraped skin. The towel turned pink in your hands. His fingers twitched once beneath your touch and he let out a hiss.
“Too rough?” you asked softly.
He shook his head. “No. Just... not used to it yet.”
You paused, letting the weight of that settle.
“I know,” you murmured. “But you will be. Eventually.”
Jason was quiet again. His gaze was fixed on the floor, but his hand never pulled from yours.
“I didn’t come back right,” he said, finally. Voice low. Raw. “You loved Jason Todd. He’s gone.”
Your chest went tight. The sting behind your eyes was immediate and sharp. You set the cloth down slowly.
No. He couldn’t just waltz into your place whenever he felt like it and say he wasn’t the man you loved.
“That’s not fair.”
His brows twitched, but he didn’t look up. “It’s true.”
“No,” you said, voice steady despite the tremble building in your throat. “It’s not.”
He scoffed, bitter and low. “You don’t know what I’ve done. What I’ve become.”
“I know exactly who you are,” you said, louder now, sharper. “Don’t you dare sit there and act like I’m some idiot who’s in love with a memory. I’ve seen you. I’ve held you. I’ve listened to you scream in your sleep and still woken up next to you in the morning.”
Jason flinched—just a little—but his hands were clenched now, tension bunching through his shoulders.
“You think I want this?” he bit out. “I was eighteen. I wanted answers, not a goddamn coffin. I shouldn’t have gone. You told me to go—”
“I know , Jason!” Your voice cracked. “Do you think I don’t know? I’ve lived with that every single day for years. You think I didn’t rip myself apart wondering if it was my fault you died?”
Silence pulsed between you. Thick. Heavy.
His eyes finally met yours—and there it was. The weight. The pain. The shame.
“I loved you,” he whispered. “So much it scared me.”
Your throat burned. “Then why are you trying to make me hate you?”
“Because it’s easier,” he said. “Because if you hate me, you’ll let go. You’ll move on. And maybe I won’t have to look at you and remember what it felt like to have a life.”
Your breath caught.
“You think I’m here because I want the old you back?” you asked, softer now. “ There is no old you. I’m here because it’s still you. Even when you think you're too far gone for anyone to ever care about you again.”
Jason blinked hard. You saw the tears, even if he didn’t let them fall.
“I still remember the way you looked at me,” you continued. “Like I was the best thing in the world. And now you look at me like I’m going to vanish. Like you’re not allowed to need me anymore.”
His shoulders dropped slightly. “You don’t know how much I still love you.”
You did.
You always did.
So you reached out, brushing the hair back from his brow with gentle fingers. His skin was warm beneath your touch—real. Present. Still here.
You leaned in close, cleaning the last of the blood from his jawline. He didn't flinch this time.
“I’m not leaving,” you said, quietly. “Even when you try to make me.”
He let out a shaky breath, the words catching in his throat.
“I don’t deserve this,” he whispered. “I don’t deserve you.”
You smiled, lips pressed to his hair. “I love you. So, so much. ”
“Horrible,” he rasped. “Useless, rotten work.”
You kissed the crown of his head. Closed your eyes.
“Not to me.”